Saturday, December 13, 2014

This morning our little library, Biblioteca Comunitaria Dr.William House celebrated the completion of our Traveling Story Time program,
made possible by a grant from Better World Books. At the beginning of July we began
with a goal of reading 1000 books to 5000 kids and training at least 25 local
volunteers to help us do it.

It was a long road with points along the way where we weren’t
sure if we were going to meet our goal on time. And then things got crazy
because of one woman’s efforts. A professor at the public university in town
saw us on the tv talking about the library. Then she did something loco. Dr. Janleyda Oleaga told each one
of her medical students that they were future servants of their community and
had better start practicing now. All of a sudden, serving our little program
was required for their course. From that day on, we’d see two or three medical
students show up at the library each afternoon asking to participate in the
program. Ummm, sure!

On Thanksgiving day—a normal day at the library—a few of the
medical students showed up to return children’s books they’d checked out and turn
in their form that all volunteers fill out (it’s a data thing) when they “travel”
to a Story Time be it at a school, a park or in a neighborhood gathering spot. Over
the course of 5 months, we held story times in 8 public schools, 23 private
schools, a local fair, a hospital, an orphanage, a government-run daycare, a
couple after-school programs, 4 parks, and at least 5 different neighborhoods.

Reading to kids in the children's hospital.

Reading to kids in a public school classroom.

So, this morning we were celebrating the meeting of our
goal. Drum rollllllllllllllll, pleeeeeeeeease.

99 volunteers participated in reading to 7,620 kids in the
city!

As we were announcing this awesome news to various media
outlets snapping photos like I was a celebrity having a night of bad decisions,
it never occurred to me that maybe I had chosen questionable attire for the
morning. Forgive any indecency in the following:

I had worn a black bra which was starting to fall apart on
one side (And yeah, pretty much all of my clothing has some “character” flaw
like this. No biggie.) with a black knit shirt.

While it is a light-weight shirt, I had no idea it would
turn out the way it did. The paparazzi have cameras with some powerful flash.
And then I flashed the internet. Like Elaine’s Christmas cards. My bra had progressively drooped over the course of the morning and by show
time:
See-ThroughShirt + DroopyBra = well, THERE. SHE. WAS.

While I fully support giving credit where credit is due, I
refuse to give out the link to the original picture as it is still on the
internet. DON’T. YOU. DARE.

And no, even if you donate a fiver to the good cause of getting kids reading, I will not share the link with you. I will, however,
promise to keep reading to kids, keep the library running and continue buying books that pull kids in to the wonderful world of reading (the "gateway" books are always the priciest ones). And dad, if you donate $10, I’ll promise to
wear a tank top underneath that shirt from now on.